A Kenyan lawyer is suing Israel and Italy for human rights violations committed against Jesus more than 2,000 years ago.
According to Kenya's Citizen News, Dola Indidis has petitioned the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to "declare that the trial of Jesus and the subsequent nailing on the cross went against the principles of fair trial and should therefore be declared a mistrial."
"Evidence today is on record in the Bible," Indidis told Citizen News, "and you cannot discredit the Bible."
According to a support letter posted on his Facebook page, Indidis is "convinced that Pontius Pilate erred in law by convicting and sentencing Jesus Christ while acknowledging his own lack of jurisdiction and the accused's innocence. I petitioned the International Court of Justice in The Hague to have the conviction and sentence quashed."
Religion News Service (RNS) broke the story stateside on Tuesday, reporting that this isn't the first time Indidis has gone to court in Jesus' defense. The Kenyan High Court in Nairobi previously declined to hear the case in 2007 because it lacked jurisdiction.
Indidis then applied to have it heard at the ICJ, which Kenyan news website SDE reports has formed a pre-trial panel to consider the case. However, an ICJ spokesperson told Legal Cheek that it was not preparing to hear the case.
"'The ICJ has no jurisdiction for such a case," the spokesperson said. "'The ICJ settles disputes between states. It is not even theoretically possible for us to consider this case.'"
That could be good news for church leaders, whom RNS reports are "surprised" by Indidis's petition. Maloba Wesonga, a spokesman for the Catholic Archdiocese of Nairobi, told RNS it was a theologically futile endeavor.
"As we know it, the trial had to happen," Wesonga told RNS. "We must understand that Jesus was not vulnerable and nobody can do justice to God."
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